Building my timber garage/workshop

again thank you Arno,

Popped over where I’m getting my polystyrene from and bought some 8x4 sheets of OSB

10x 11mm OSB, placing these on top of the floor polystyrene and 26x 9mm OSB and these will be for the walls and ceiling holing up the polystyrene

Got these at a good price, all in £574, around £200 cheaper than my builders merchant, (heres hoping I get no issues with these)

I came across these (this is small part, they are 1M long)





These are placed under stacks of OSB and other materials to keep apart so they can get their fork lift prongs under the stacks to move them, as not all the materials come on pallets, these are good up to a weight of around 3 tones, they use them once then bin them so I asked how much for a pallet of these, I got them for £10 for 2 pallets full

I plan on using these between the floor polystyrene and screw the OSB to these, maybe cut the OSB in half so the polystyrene has more support, one issue these are 70mm x 50mm

I did some painting before screwing these down under the roof sheets





This is the gable side, this bad painting will be hidden behind the edging/flashing when finished



For the diesel heater exhaust after doing some googling, I came across a few ideas

Apparently there are kits available for these exhausts (for original German diesel heaters)



and a few people have made their own,

The length that runs through the wood and OSB they have placed a tin around the exhaust and filled the tin with Rockwool insulation




Food for thought

Good to see you are progressing nicely, hope your back is holding up ok.

Those pallet separating chipboard things burn quite well on a log burner, I would stick them up for sale or free rather than bin them as long as they are still dry.

The can is precisely what I did with the diesel heater I fitted to the lockdown lockup, where it passed through the larch cladding, I have seen no charring of the wood so far

Well done, soon be finished!

It’s been along time since I updated this thread, but I’ve been busy at it just at a slower pace (yes it’s me back slowing me down)



I’ve noticed when we get strong rain with or without winds, in places the dwarf wall weeps water below the DPC between the sand & cement joints or between the concrete pad and the brickwork, enough to spread 30cm to 40cm in to the garage floor


Since this image was taken I’ve sealed the joints between the timber and the timber firings/sleepers

I’ve yet to lay the floor insulation & DPC membrane in the garage so I’m open to any options

The thing is I’m not sure what’s best to seal the brickwork from the rain, I have read up on using clear water proof sealants, Black Bitumen Paint or doing Tanking on the dwarf wall, so I’m a bit lost on what’s best and easiest for me to do

PS I have lots of images to show my progress, for now just a few images and I’ll do a proper post when I get some free time






















































Many thanks for any help with the water proofing the dwarf wall

I’ve left this thread far too long without updates, I’ve been very busy and not got round to posting updates, I hope I’ve got these images in some sort of chronological order, if I’ve misplaced an image or two out or order my apologies

starting off where (I think) I lift off, laying the concrete base at the garage doors, after leaving it over night I spent the next three of days watering the concrete sopping it drying too soon as it was in the middle of the hot summer were were having









Then followed up the moisture barrier over the garage doors, the last part to do



I strung a line helping me to make the boxing for the OSB going over the doors









While I was waiting for the EPD, ply and OSB, after chatting to my structural engineer friend I decided to take out most (I ended up taking out all the 60mm and 70mm) roof sheet bolts and replace them with 120mm bolts















To be sure I was hitting a joist and not fresh air I poked the holes with a wire to know where the joist I was aiming for was





I filled the ridges on the sheets with builders expandable foam







Then I made a start on the Roof Edge Trim, I used the same silicon I used for the knots in my timber


























For the corners I cut the edge tricot form an overlap























That was for the sides, now for the front, I had double sided tape to stick the foam that was provided with the sheets and cut off the extruding expanding foam











Then I made a start at taking off the shuttering off the garage opening and still have the rods poking out to bond in to the concrete ramp I’ll be laying later (maybe next year now)









Then I set about waterproofing the brick joint at the concrete pad area as damp was entering the garage floor at this location, I first bought spray sealant and went all round giving it a couple of coats, first going round with a brush







I tidied up some ruff pointing and scraped off any loos mortar







With all the dust and debris around the walls I couldn’t see how bad the joint to the concrete was











When it rained a day or two later the sealant did it’s job



But I wasn’t convinced this was going to be a permanent solution so I ordered 25Lt of bitumen, worked out much cheaper per litre than if I bought a 5 or 10 litre can, around £60 delivered



I set about masking thee area I was going to paint, I didn’t want the bitumen going all over the place







Then with a tar brush I set about doing some painting







I also painted the bitumen on the inside of the concrete garage opening



Would you believe it if the following day it didn’t bloody well rain, not just rain but cat and dogs kind of rain, I went out and took a look at the mess









The following day you couldn’t tell it rained the day before, and the bitumen hadn’t spread, it was only the oil part of it that followed the water



Last year (or the year before that) I bought a barrel of 205 litres of red diesel, but the barrel couldn’t be taken anywhere near where I wanted it near the garage, so I went out and bought a secondhand barrel for £15 and placed it where I wanted it



I had placed it on a couple of breeze blocks but after a day or so I wasn’t happy with this so built a concrete pad for the barrel











Fuel gauge



And the air breather and take up pipe to the Chinese diesel heater



Not wanting to be taking any chances of the diesel turning to a kind of jelly if frozen I layer out the piping in some guttering pipes and used foam lagging round the hose







I also bought a diesel pump and 16 metres of diesel resistant hose to pump diesel from its original location to this new barrel





Eventually the insulation arrived



This was for the floor, EPS 200 with a density of 30Kg/M3 x12 good enough to hold up the Elise with no problem







And then the ply for the floor









Did a good clean up in the garage ready for the DPM



















At first I laid them left to right looking in to the garage, but then after a discussion with my engineering friend I started back to front (looking back I'm should of started front to back) this way I could lay more timber joists between the insulation, I measured up the insulation and the seats were 240cm x 120cm so made my joist to fit and cut the insulation to get me two extra joists in the 120cm



Now how did I cut them! Well the blade I bought to use with the jigsaw was no good as it kept bending, so I got out my hand saw and this proved to be very hard work, I then used my Japanese saw and this was a bit better but still hard work



Then I made myself a hot blade using 7.5M Long AWG21 0.7mm Diameter Resistor Wire for Kiln Furnace, off Amazon £10, this made light work of cutting the insulation







I used two bolts and drilled hole for the wire to go through







As mentioned after chatting with my engineer friend I changed the direction of the joists

















The insulation was dead on 100mm high, the joist were to be 100mm x 50mm but the are a bit less after planing so the joists were only 96mm x 46mm so I ended up getting a sheet of 6mm ply and had it cut in to strips of 40mm wide to pack the joist up







It was so hot in the garage I had to use our fan to keep me cool







This little contraption was a life savour, with it I was able to lift and move all the 8x4 ply with ease, without it I would of needed another person and even then it would of been difficult to get a good grip on the sheet







The last bits



I filed up the gaps between the insulation and joists with expandable foam





On laying my ply sheets, what did I discover!!! The sheets weren’t 240cm x 120cm, the ply were all 8x4, all my measuring to get the joists centre for the ply was a waste of time and had to make a fresh start with cutting the ply, and this never really worked out as good as my carpentry skills are not top notch

Anyway after the ply was laid I made a start on the wall insulation, but this time I made myself a longer hot knife 250cm long so I could cut the insulation with only having to lower the wire on to the insulation and not having to saw through it, I filed up the space between the floor and the wall insulation timber

















What stroke of luck Lidl had these, pipe bender, handy for my diesel pipe and this PVC conduit cutter I’ll need for my wiring conduit



I mentioned before (I think) this concrete bap was laid down as a compound for our two big dogs the had, they once passed away so the compound wasn’t being used for anything, when the builder finished laying the concrete he fenced it off with that plastic orange builders netting they use, well my dog Alfie

The first day home with us







Molly and Alfie together



Well Alfie to one jump over this netting and onto the fresh concrete he went, leaving behind his footprints







There might be some errors here or there as it’s a long post

This is how I've set up my heater system, with the coolant +EGR



the instruction mention to have the exhaust pointing slightly down to let any condensate weep out the muffler



I have the exhaust on a slight tilt downs as shown on this cross section diagram of the timber wall



the exhaust doesn’t go over 200c, I’ve lagged the exhaust if that will help and for safety reasons, also after I paint the walls and have it permanently fixed I’ll fit a wire shield around the exhaust should I or others trip and place my or their hands on the hot exhaust

My 12v DC fan, 12v DC coolant pump and rad had arrived, this new rad has 20mm hose connections opposed to the EGR with 16mm hose connections,





I have the exhaust on a slight tilt downs as shown on this cross section diagram of the timber wall

Just caught up with this thread for the first time, seriously good read. Thanks for sharing your work, looks like it will be a great space.

I’m hoping all this insulation helps keep out the cold, my plan was always to have some form of double glazing with the skylights and these Polycarbonate Sheets look a good solution keeping the ceiling insulated and also let in light, once I’ve painted the top coat on the ceiling I’ll get these delivered

The other thing I’ll eventually add to the skylights is some form of blinds to keep out bright sunlight in summer,

I want garage doors with a personnel door, I never liked up and over doors, OK to get the car in and out but the amount of times the car would be driving in and out per year I could maybe count this on my hands

My plan was fitting barn doors with a personnel door, my engineer friend pointed out the weight of these 2M wide doors would need some form of support, by either a wheel at the bottom edge of the doors so no weight was pulling from the door frame or the door frame would need extra reinforcing

Together we’ve decided that having bifold doors for this would be a good solution so together we’ve come up with some ideas of what we’re looking for











I’ve phoned & emailed out these plus more detailed plans for these doors to advertised door makers (on the web)to get a budget price to work from and all have priced me for aluminium doors, one guy told me Wooden doors are expensive compared to aluminium and said a garage door of my size would be around £18,000, I told hime I thought £4,500 per 8x4 door panel was a bit too steep for my pockets, this coming week I’ll be contacting a couple of local joinery companies and see what they come up with